Sunday, February 01, 2015

Much Needed Education Everywhere

As an industry we know there’s quite a few areas that are
troublesome.If asked most people will
mention the need for qualified employees such as manufacturing help, maintenance
and on the glazing side, project managers.But the next need mentioned is usually education and it’s nice to see
the efforts one company is putting towards that effort.The PPG Glass Education Center is an
incredible resource.I visited it again
this week after the release of their newest video on Weather Resistant Design
and I was once again blown away.There
is simply a ton of info on there from the basic to the very advanced.It can be a training center for new employees
and a great resource for seasoned veterans.In the end, it’s a very impressive vehicle for our industry to use.Major kudos to Paul DiCesare and the tech
team at PPG on the content, as well as Paul Bush on that regard and of course,
I must give props to the marketing guru Rob Struble for his efforts on making
this fly.Well done folks!

Elsewhere…

More props for companies doing good things…

-- How about Viracon?The folks there raised more than $111,000 for the United Way of Steele
County.That is simply an amazing and awesome
total.Congrats to Carla Kern who
chaired this effort for Viracon and every employee there for giving of
themselves.

-- And another one while I am at it… Garibaldi Glass announced
their intent to have their annual “Glass Day” program on May 1st.This is going to be the 5th
edition of an event that provides tremendous education and insight into our
industry.I have heard so much about
this event over the years and my goal this year is to finally be there in
person.And yes while an event like this
has a great benefit to Garibaldi, it also does wonders in educating the region
(glaziers, architects, owners etc.) on the world of glass and glazing.

-- Education will also be at the forefront at Glass Processing
Automation Days in San Antonio in March.Info on this event was just released and it has the potential to offer
some great insight for the fabricator.I’ll surely have more on this as it gets closer.

-- OK time to move from compliments and congratulations to
snarky with and oldie but a goodie.My
old favorite group, the NFRC is possibly getting some competition.Unfortunately its not in our actual industry
or the areas where I have always pushed for, but this could lead to openings
elsewhere.The Window Covering
Manufacturers Association with support from the DOE is starting the Attachments
Energy Ratings Council (AERC).So now the
NFRC which has always been the one and only group with the ability to rate window
film and attachments could be getting some competition if this takes off.And its competition with the backing of the
DOE.That is huge.So this will be one to watch.If this effort actually works, it will open
the door to much needed competition to NFRC on the glass and glazing side.That would be fantastic.But in the end, I go with the word “if”
because the NFRC has staved off every challenge known to man, so I would not be
surprised if this latest move does not take hold.

-- Next week I will have my Super Bowl commercial
likes/dislikes since that is now my favorite part of the game. I'm also still trying to figure out why the Seahawks passed instead of ran at the end. Amazing failure there. Wow.

The news that Eddie Murphy will return to Saturday Night
Live in a few weeks will actually get me to watch the show.I loved Eddie back in the day… can’t wait to
see what he does.In the meantime here’s
a quick look at some of his best stuff…